About a Village: Children of the High Woods

Film screening, discussion with the producer, writer and director , John Swanson

Where is one’s true home? For Elsa Koch and her circle of friends this question is more complicated than for most of us. Born in a German-speaking village in southern Hungary, they were forced to leave after the Second World War, still children. Although they eventually succeeded in building their lives in post-war Germany, the transition was not easy. No wonder that the small Hungarian village keeps occupying a special place in their hearts. Is that world gone forever or have they managed to hold onto it throughout the past six decades? Is it in fact a physical place or more of an inner landscape? The viewer is free to reply to these questions or leave them unanswered. The characters in the film tell the story and express their occasionally conflicting views in their own words, leaving room for interpretation. This is a film about people who were affected by historical events and not a film about “history.”

John C. Swanson is Associate Professor of History in Utica College, Syracuse University. His research project attempts to problematize the process that could be seen as the transition of rural German speakers in Hungary from German-speaking Hungarians to Volksdeutsche during the twentieth century.